


Message in a Bottle

by JSumner



Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Post-Hell Bent, Whouffaldi if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-09
Updated: 2015-12-09
Packaged: 2018-05-05 20:15:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5388815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JSumner/pseuds/JSumner
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Clara's down, her TARDIS plays songs that remind her of her time with the Doctor, and songs that he wrote. As time goes by, she's realizing just how busy her rock star Time Lord has been. Also featuring helpful TARDISes!</p><p>Look, basically I needed something happy/hopeful after "Hell Bent." I'm guessing you did, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Message in a Bottle

By the end of her first week with Ashildr, Clara had come to two conclusions: one, that perhaps two TARDISes could be in cahoots as surely as two people could, and two, that the Doctor had ghostwritten a fair amount of rock songs over the years.

As to the first, most of her belongings from the Doctor's TARDIS had shown up on the new TARDIS with no effort on her part (although there were a few smallish things missing, like her favorite perfume). And then there was the fact that their TARDIS would play the Doctor's song about her from all the speakers when it could sense that Clara was feeling down.

Occasionally it would play "Mysterious Girl" as well, and she was sure that both TARDISes were having her on, reminding her of the two weeks when that song had been stuck in the Doctor's head and he tried to work the earworm out by repeatedly singing and playing it on his guitar. And sometimes it would play Foxes' rendition of "Don't Stop Me Now," reminding her of their not-so-last hurrah on the Orient Express. But mostly it would play other songs, songs that he'd obviously had a hand in creating. As time went on she realized there were a staggering number of them.

She remembers when she learned that the Doctor was doing more than trying to figure out how to play his favorite songs by ear when he noodled around on his guitar. Very late one night she had walked into the control room to find Roy Orbison sitting there with the Doctor, both of them working through "Oh, Pretty Woman," the Doctor quietly suggesting some words to fit the chord progression they had just come up with. When he caught sight of Clara, he gave her his toothiest grin over Orbison's shoulder. Bootstrap Paradox, indeed.

So she knew these songs were his. They were all by different artists, with accordingly different styles, but she could have picked them out anywhere. If she hadn't been able to really "see" the Doctor in her grey stick insect until Chin Boy had made his pleading call to her, now she could feel his presence in all of these songs as clearly as if he were playing them for her across the counter. When she listened to them and closed her eyes, she could practically picture his blue eyes shining at her over the frames of his Wayfarers. Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir" and Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon spoke of his travels. And then there were the songs where she caught glimpses of herself and their relationship: Metallica’s “Nothing Else Matters” and The Who's “Bargain” for instance. In these songs, she could feel his longing for her and what they’d had.

New songs had been popping up lately; most of Coldplay's _A Head Full of Dreams_ and a fair few from the new Def Leppard album talked to her with the Doctor’s voice. From the abundance of music, she knew he was still thinking of her, still trying to solve the puzzle of his Impossible Girl even through his neural block. Impossible Man, he would never give up. If 4.5 billion years in his confession dial hadn’t stopped him, she doubted this would. It was simultaneously thrilling and exasperating, just like the Doctor himself.

One night, after the adrenaline rush from her latest adventure with Ashildr had worn off and Clara was feeling a little low thinking about her old life, she found her way to their TARDIS’s small library. On the shelf beside the handwritten copy of _Pride and Prejudice_ that Jane Austen had given her, she found a small clockwork squirrel. It had definitely not been there the last time she was in the room, and she was sure it had never been on her ship. In fact she hadn’t seen it for months before they had gone to the trap street. The last she could remember, it had been sitting on the Doctor’s amp.

Clara wound the squirrel up. It chittered and the tail started flicking side to side. She smiled at it, remembering the Doctor’s assertion that it wasn’t nearly annoying enough and that he would have to revamp it. When she hadn't seen it again, she assumed the Doctor had gotten bored with it and re-built a radio out of it. She put the squirrel down on a nearby table and watched it skitter off.

She wondered where it had come from and was just about to call for Ashildr to ask when the TARDIS hummed a bit and Clara understood. A gift from the ship, then. And not just her ship, but the Doctor’s ship as well. They'd gotten off to a rocky start, the Doctor's TARDIS and Clara, but it was nice to know that she'd come round in the end. Her own TARDIS warbled a bit, and music began to play from the speakers camouflaged in the corners of the room:

“Been around the world, universe too  
I've been around flying, baby, there's nothing I wouldn't do  
Dance with the stars, while I see the moon  
I'll be standing there beside you  
Right when the storm comes through

Cause I'll never say die, I'm never untrue  
I'm never so high as when I'm with you  
And there isn't a fire, that I wouldn't walk through  
My army of one is going to fight for you  
My army of one is going to fall for you, yeah”

She put her hand to the wall, silently thanking the TARDIS for the gift and for the peace of mind it had brought her. She picked up the Austen manuscript and settled down to read, comfortable in mind and spirit for the first time since she’d overheard the Doctor and Ashildr talking about the Hybrid at the end of the universe. After all, if the two TARDISes could pass a clockwork squirrel between them, it seemed likely that someday they might conspire to do the same with an Impossible Girl or her Time Lord. All she had to do was wait. And listen to his music.

**Author's Note:**

> The second time I watched "Hell Bent," I realized (after the tears) that the ending is actually really hopeful. The image of the two TARDISes whirling off stuck with me, and that, combined with waking up to The Who's "Bargain" (go listen to it, it's Twelve and Clara all through) gets you this fic, the first one I've written in a decade.
> 
> The song playing at the end is Coldplay's "Army of One" from their A Head Full of Dreams album. I wasn't kidding, the entire album sounds like Twelve had a hand in it. Thanks to some of my favorite Society members for coming up with the idea of Twelve writing famous rock songs and running with it. It apparently was a fic prompt that I couldn't ignore.


End file.
